"Jif" not "Gif"

[jimakos84]

i pronounced it jif anyway :P

[XDurionX]

Go sit on a Grenade! English is one fucked up language.....

And "fish" is spelled ghoti. gh as in "laugh", o as in "women" and ti as in nation.

[Evil Inside]

Still gif for me, and it'll stay giff lol.

[Payday]

And "fish" is spelled ghoti. gh as in "laugh", o as in "women" and ti as in nation.

Feh-shee??

[Tribunal]

If .gif is pronounced the same way as .jif, how does one tell them apart verbally?

How do you tell other homonyms/homographs/homophones apart, be it writing or pronunciation? Context is required for English, to it's great detriment and benefit. Context is also not hard.

[Vorality]

If the inventor wants it to be pronounced "Jif" then that's how it was intended to be pronounced and that's how it SHOULD be pronounced. Who cares what the spelling is. It can still be .Gif and pronounced as if a "j". Not sure why this thread is even here and people are actually debating over this. How the hell do you guys say Giraffe? Guh-raff?

[Doktor Faustus]

The OED have stated it does not matter what the creator things, pronunciation is now GIF.

[Agent Mercury]

The OED told the BBC that it was beyond the software engineer's control to determine how the word should be said. Suck it.

---------- Post added 2013-05-23 at 12:59 PM ----------

The OED have stated it does not matter what the creator things, pronunciation is now GIF.

Actually OED says it can be done both ways.

[Deleted]

If the inventor wants it to be pronounced "Jif" then that's how it was intended to be pronounced and that's how it SHOULD be pronounced.

Nope, he's wrong. The internet has agreed it's pronounced GIF, so it shall continue being called GIF. GIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIF!!!!!!!!!!

[Ryme]

Nope, he's wrong. The internet has agreed it's pronounced GIF, so it shall continue being called GIF. GIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIF!!!!!!!!!!

The internet has spoken! All hail it's mighty laws!

[Tribunal]

Nope, he's wrong. The internet has agreed it's pronounced GIF, so it shall continue being called GIF. GIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIFGIF!!!!!!!!!!

Most everyone I've ever met, online or off, says JIF. Plus, online, you're mostly dealing in text, with no indication of pronunciation in either direction.

Sooo anecdotal evidence is anecdotal.

[Tucci]

I've always called it "Jif" but my friends called it "Gif" which always sounded weird to me. So yay, me.

[Tinykong]

How do you tell other homonyms/homographs/homophones apart, be it writing or pronunciation? Context is required for English, to it's great detriment and benefit. Context is also not hard.

They are both image formats, so your argument about context is a fail.

"Hey Rick, did you send me over that jif yet?"

"Wait, I thought you wanted it in a gif format?"

"Yeah I do, a jif."

"You mean you want a graphics interchange format, or a jpeg?"

"A graphics interchange format."

See how it's just easier to call it a gif?

[Lumineus]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22620473

My life is a lie!

I'm sorry, but what? Unless you pronounce graphical as "giraffe-ical" that pronunciation of GIF makes no sense.

[Klutzington]

The G in Gift doesn't even sound like the G in Graphic. As for Jigabyte, do you say PUH-neumonia? Or Al-mond (opposed to ahlmond)?

Sometimes English words are not pronounced as they are spelled. English names are especially not pronounced as spelled (look at the furor over all the variations people came up with for Hermione).

Edit: I suppose some of you in this thread have a fit over "oz." too, right?

Uh, yes it does. You pronounce the same G sound. The letters after it make the rest of the word sound differently. It's like saying the J's in jewel and Jayne sound differently!!!1!!1

[Darsithis]

It's "gif" to me, forever.

[Shakari]

The guy who created the file type is saying its pronounced like Jif, so it isn't really wrong, it's just silly.

Its more than silly, you don't call it "Graphics Interchange Format" and then try and say it starts with a "J" .........

Its just plain wrong lol GIF is an abbreviation just like for example PNG is "Portable Network Graphics"

Try and tell me you pronounce the "P" in PNG in any other way.

[Payday]

Its more than silly, you don't call it "Graphics Interchange Format" and then try and say it starts with a "J" .........

Its just plain wrong lol GIF is an abbreviation just like for example PNG is "Portable Network Graphics"

Try and tell me you pronounce the "P" in PNG in any other way.

Try and tell me how you pronounce PNG in the form of a word, as .gif is..

[Eroginous]

So how do you differentiate lead and lead? Do you spell one wrong just to keep things somewhat intelligent? Or if we're sticking just to pronunciation, do you say to/too/two differently?

Nope, it's all about context and usage. In this case, both .gif and .jif are file types. If you pronounced them both 'jif' when talking to someone, the context really muddles the ability to differentiate between the file types.

The only clear course of action is to pronounce them correctly according to how they are spelled.

It's not rocket science.

[melodramocracy]

Until it's .jif, im afraid it's gif.

Exactly.

Most folks mispronounce cache when using it as a computer term as well, so...